33.8 America: a.d. 1801 to 1900  (Page 9/31)

In the United States early the word "slave" became synonymous with "black", "African" or "nigger" and since there were many Indian slaves, they were of ten subject to the same names and, in fact, considered the same. Actually genetically the southern Negro was a product of Africans, whites and Indians. After slave importation from Africa was outlawed and Indian slave raids in the South had become relatively insignificant, the percentage of males among those races of the south changed. The male Africans decreased in percentage while the male Indians increased. The famed Seminole Chief Osceola's spouse, or at least one of them, in all probability was a Negro and his father in all likelihood was white. A physical anthropologist who has examined Osceloa's bones has speculated that he had African forebears as well. Many modern Negroes are doubtless correct in claiming direct descent from that great Seminole warrior. As the Cherokees became increasingly cultured, they adopted white attitudes toward Negroes, but it was different among the Seminoles. Both slave and free Africans lived among them and indeed were a part of the Seminoles and their presence became more conspicuous during the 19th century Seminole wars. In 1818 General Andrew Jackson stormed into Spanish Florida and his major objective was Bowlegs Town, a sizable Negro settlement on the Suwannee River. (Ref. 267 )

As Monroe's Secretary of State, in December, 1823, John Quincy Adams insisted that the president issue what became known as the Monroe Doctrine. As a warning to European pawers who might have designs on any of the new central and south American governments and to Russia, who was claiming new territory on the Canadian coast, the doctrine may be summarized as follows:

• The American continent was not to be considered as subject for future colonization by European powers
• The U.S. would not interfere with any existing European colonies

John quincy adams (1825-29) a minority president

Adams was a great patriot and wanted to use federal revenue to increase the navy, build national roads and canals, send out scientific expeditions and establish institutions of learning and research, but most of these things were not to materialize for some years to come.

Andrew jackson (old hickory) (1829-37) 6th president and martin van buren (1837-41) 7th president

This was the era of the great political figures - Adams, Clay, Webster, Van Buren and Calhoun, and it marked the beginning of the modern Democratic political party. The Adams - Jackson political campaign of 1828 was the most degrading experience of an election that the United States had experienced. Jackson was ill-educated, intolerant and rough, yet professing the principles of the Declaration of Independence and devoted to the union. Jacksonian democracy was the upsurge of a new generation of recently enfranchised voters against a somewhat ossified Jefferson Republican party. (Ref. 151 ) Jackson Democrats believed in equality only for white men and they introduced the spoils system into federal government, catered to mediocrity and diluted politics with the incompetent and the corrupt. The jackass as a symbol of the Democratic party was first used by the opposing Whigs as a satire on the supposed ignorance of "Old Hickory". Two vital issues of that time were: